Thursday, 19 December 2013

Colour printing

I've done some printing in colour. After buying Etching in Colour by Nigel Oxley I learned how to do a correctly registered print, using the same plate, but with different applications of ink, layered onto the same piece of paper. It has been something I've fought shy of for 3 years, being unsure of getting it right. Why did I wait?

The first print was a combination of drypoint scratching on a sheet of mylar inked in yellow, then blue and magenta on the original etched plate, printed over. the mylar didn't last very long, and I hadn't quite sorted out my exact registration. The second print is a combination of the mylar, then printing the magenta only on the toy itself, and finally the blue on the background. During this experiment I had to use scrim (muslin) to apply and brush the ink off, which is a better way of doing complicated prints, rather than using yellow pages which makes it hard to see where you're brushing.

The second type of print was made by inking only certain areas of the plate, then reprinting with different colours. It gives some really interesting colour combinations.

This is the original black and white print, which a friend has described as 'spacey'. He was spot on.